Traveller failed to assist with tracing

PRECIOUS hours were wasted when a woman infected with COVID-19 refused to co-operate with authorities for more than a day, as new details emerged of a police investigation into her trip with two others to Melbourne to procure high-end designer gear.

It can be revealed specialist police were called in to bring family members of Olivia Winnie Muranga and Diana Lasu into hotel quarantine, amid fears they were also infected with the virus.

It has also emerged the pair hosted an Airbnb party at a Melbourne CBD apartment — while the virusriddled city was in hard lockdown — two days before allegedly lying to get back into Queensland, according to police.

Muranga and Lasu remained under police guard in the prison ward of the Princess Alexandra Hospital on Thursday as police charged them and a third travelling companion with providing false or misleading documents and fraud — for which the maximum penalty is five years’ jail.

The women are alleged to have lied about whether they had travelled to a coronavirus hotspot to get back into Queensland by flying home from Melbourne via Sydney.

Police initially investigated the movements of Muranga and Lasu before revealing a third woman had travelled with them.

The deception, which police claim was “planned” has exposed the vulnerability of Queensland’s “honour system” border restrictions, with authorities not realising Muranga and Lasu were moving around the community while infected for eight days.

Police and health authorities are using mobile phone data and banking information to track the movements of the women, with Lasu refusing to cooperate with contact tracers until late Thursday.